Can you really waste time?

It’s one of those deep fears that come up many times in many conversations.

And I don’t think so.

Notion one: time doesn’t exist.

Time is an idea that needs a shitload of other ideas to work and feel real.

Time is a mental construct made out of thoughts about the past and the future, that creates a specific chronological story and historical moments.

Very realistic, for sure.

But it still doesn’t really exist.

And the last time I checked, you couldn’t waste or fuck up something that doesn’t exist in the first place.

So…

There’s that.

And, yeah I get it.

I’m not an ignorant asshole.

Of course I know very well that the mental world with all of its concepts is our world of reference and realness.

But here’s another notion, number two.

Yesterday I had a conversation with my daughter about the ‘academic year’ that will follow this summer.

She has almost finished her three years at University College and now will be taking some time off to play around, work a bit, do some traveling, and explore life without too much responsibility.

In the conversation we had, she told me about a friend of hers who will be an intern for a while at the end of the year, and now she was worryingly wondering if she wasn’t supposed to do something like that too.

Something USEFUL.

Something that could occupy a professional, serious, and intentional segment on her resume.

Something that is better or more purposeful than just living life for a bit, getting into adventures for the sake of experimentation, and simply relaxing for a while.

The thing is: she doesn’t even know what to do next when it comes to vocation or career, and her parents totally support that complete lack of plans.

She has no clue when it comes to a specific job or professional field.

And she hasn’t even really been bothered that much by the idea of following the perfect career path, at least not chronically.

But what she DOES know is this fucked up sense of ‘not doing what you’re supposed to do, or COULD do’.

The haunting notion of missing out, of letting it slide, of slacking.

The painful uncertainty of not picking up all the opportunities that are waiting around the corner… of your mind.

So even if she is still really young and can grow up to have at least twenty-five completely different careers all around the world, there’s this societally infused urge to ‘always get the most out of life.’

To do things that are useful.

Things that stack up towards The Life You Deserve To Live, the Instagram Way, or the Ultimate Dream Existence.

Things that prove you’re most definitely not wasting any time.

But you can’t.

It’s literally impossible.

Whatever you do is what you do, whatever you live is exactly what you live, and no matter how many alternative things you COULD have done instead of what’s actually happening, those things don’t exist.

Your life is always perfect because that’s the way it unfolds.

And the way it doesn’t unfold, is the way that doesn’t exist.

It’s not fair and terribly unrealistic to measure the success of anything you do by comparing it to what is not happening.

This life is this life, now, and what it’s not, is the life in your mind that you should have been living.

Which, by the way, doesn’t mean that it can’t change (because it always will) and can’t change for the better.

But it can’t change right now, at this moment.

Many people fuck up a big chunk of their lives by comparing what is to what could have been.

By feeling guilty and lazy and incompetent because of a fictional difference.

By feeling like shit because of a life that doesn’t exist.

And maybe that is actually the only way you can waste time.

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(Photo by @kunjparekh, for Unsplash)